How to Get Ready for Holiday Sales Now

I know, I know - it's the end of June. You have to start planning your holiday selling season now.

I'm serious. Really, I am.

Here are some things to think about:photo © 2007 christina rutz | more info (via: Wylio)


1) What are your core product and service offerings going to be? If you haven't ordered what you need, get on that right away. Are your purveyors going to have to make something new for you? It should already be in development or you'll likely miss your deadline.

2) How are you going to promote those offerings? Via catalog? On your web site? Online ads? Social media? In-store display? Print advertising? Billboards? You need to order outdoor and print advertising now and look into which web sites to target for online ads. Now is also a good time to start design concepts for your catalog or other mail promotions. If you're brick-and-mortar, you need to start designing in-store display. If you need anything special - like new hardware for special banners or custom-made decor, you'll need to get to ordering now.

3) What's your launch date? Holiday is starting earlier and earlier - last year, we saw Christmas decorations in stores right around Halloween! This seemed a bit early to me - most businesses will need to  be ready in early November. If your business does layaway, compute the average number of weeks customers do layaway, and plan to announce your holiday layaway specials somewhere in that timeframe. Figure out your launch date and then design your project plan working backwards.

4) How are you going to be celebrating with your customers? If you're sending them cards, you need to order them this summer if you want them imprinted with your brand. If you're planning on doing a special loyalty promotion, price it out now as you're ordering product.

Did you find this blog post completely alarming? No worries - I can help you with all of this.

It's Monday. Three Ways to Drive Sales Today

It's Monday morning. You're still waiting for that coffee to kick in.

Meanwhile, you're reviewing last week's sales. And they're not where they need to be.

What can you do?
photo © 2006 Pete Barr-Watson | more info (via: Wylio)

1. Beef up your customer loyalty program. 
What are you doing to thank your most loyal customers? Are there any sales you have going on right now that they might want to know about? Make sure that 1) you're thanking them, and 2) you're asking for a sale.

2. Push your most profitable product.
Which one of your products has the best margin right now? Shouldn't you be selling more of it? Put it in your stores' front windows, advertise it front and center on your web site, and promote it on your social media channels. The more you sell, the more efficiently you're making money.

3. Try a new channel.
Today is the day it's finally time to stop procrastinating and start your Facebook page. You can let fans know about your latest specials, events and promotions, and new products.

So, what are you waiting for?

Make Monday work for you. Need help? Ask me how.

Marketing News Roundup - June 24, 2011

What's new in marketing (and elsewhere) this week?

A new analysis of LivingSocial and Groupon customers finds that LivingSocial draws a slightly older, more affluent user, though both sites draw people that are more affluent and educated than the average Internet user. (eMarketer)
photo © 2007 włodi | more info (via: Wylio)

EBay will launch a Facebook sharing function that will enable users to drag and drop eBay products into their Facebook feeds for their friends to vote on and comment. (Direct Marketing News)

Sonic the Hedgehog is turning 20. A lot has changed since 1991, when the blue dude launched on the Sega Genesis. Today, it's not so uncommon to see video game megastars with movies, tv shows, and more, but Sonic started it all. (BBC)

Need a smarter team? Harvard Business Review says you should add some women. Adding women to your team raises collective intelligence, improving brainstorming and decision making. (HBR)

Have a great weekend, and thanks for reading!

Do You Need a Mobile App?

So a new report from Flurry claims that consumers are now spending more time using mobile apps than on the Internet (thanks, Mashable, for getting this some attention). Consumers are spending an average of 81 minutes daily using mobile apps vs. 74 minutes of web surfing.

So, this means you need to go right out and create your own mobile app, right?

Not exactly. We'll talk about this in a second.
photo © 2010 clive darr | more info (via: Wylio)


The first thing you need to do (if you haven't already), is visit your web site while using your mobile phone, and the mobile phones of a few of your friends. What you see on your desktop isn't what you'll see on your Blackberry, Droid, iPhone, or tablet. Make sure people using any popular smartphone or tablet these days can use your site. 

Questions to ask:

1) Can they read your content or do they have to keep zooming in, zooming out, and scrolling back and forth?

2) Is your site fully functional via mobile? Can people order your products, access customer service, and easily navigate to your content?

3) Is there something most customers on a mobile would want to see first on your site, like maybe your phone number or directions? How can you make this easier for them to find?

So, now it's time to create your own app, right? Not exactly.

It can be expensive to get a developer to make you your very own app. So think about apps that are already out there that can be used to promote or access your business. Ask yourself:

1) Is your business available to people using social apps, like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn?

2) If you're brick-and-mortar, are you sharable on check-in apps like FourSquare and SCVNGR?

3) If you run a restaurant, are you available on review sites like Urbanspoon, and reservation apps like OpenTable?

So NOW is it time for my own mobile app?

Sure. But really give some thought to a problem your mobile app will solve, and if there's an app already out there that can be used. After all, existing apps (like Urbanspoon, for example) already have a dedicated audience. If you make your own app, you're starting over.

Also, games are great and it's tempting to make your own game for people to play. But how does this help? Does it really get people to buy more of your product or is it just an opportunity for people to play at your expense?

That said, it can't hurt to talk with an app developer and see what kind of ideas they might have for you.

You might also consider holding an app development contest for your customers. See what they think you should be doing on your mobile.

All apped out? Let me know. I can help.

Seven Ways to Beat the Creative Block

It's hard to get up every day and be 100% creative.

Sometimes I get up and I'm just not inspired. Here's what I do when I'm all out of great ideas.

1) Check my Twitter account. This is where I connect to other people who do what I do, so I can see what they are thinking about today. It's also a great source of overall news and interesting ideas.

2) Login to LinkedIn and see what my connections are doing. Is anyone working on anything interesting? Did anyone post anything thought-provoking in one of my groups? The answer to this is almost always yes.

photo © 2008 Cornelia Kopp | more info (via: Wylio)
3) LinkedIn has also recently launched a feature called LinkedIn Today, which displays headlines based on your chosen news sources and what's being shared by the most people. This is another great way to find out what people find relevant right now.

4) Checking google trends tells me what the most popular google searches are right now. While this usually just confirms for me that I'm way behind on my pop culture, it can be a great way to find out what's top of mind out there.

5) Sometimes I visit Wikipedia's main page. Wikipedia will tell you what happened on this day in history (which is always of interest), provide the latest news, and showcase a few other interesting things I didn't know.

6) It's usually worthwhile to take a 10-minute break to watch a TED talk. Some of the most inspiring people around are on TED and there's always the opportunity to learn something new.

7) If I'm still not inspired, maybe today's not a day for creative work. Maybe it's time to take a break and do something else. It really can help to just give myself permission not to be creative today. I can work on many other things - accounting, reporting, customer service, or other project work. Sometimes getting organized is all I need to get unblocked.

How do you cope when you feel blocked? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Marketing News Roundup - June 17, 2011

What's new in marketing (and elsewhere) this week?

Is the age of extremely conspicuous consumption officially over? Mercedes seriously considers dumping the Maybach, or just totally redesigning it. (Autoweek)

Students at Stanford have started a budget-by-text service that helps lower-income families budget and save by documenting their spending. What could you document that would help you better meet your own goals? (FastCompany)

Musician Kim Boekbinder has developed a way to fund her concerts ahead of time. Fans tell her where they want her to perform, and when there’s enough people to offset costs, she finds a venue that’s the right size and books a show. No more empty concert halls. No more cancelled shows and let-down fans. I love this way of empowering everyone but the major record labels (and really, why couldn’t they do this too? Might bring down the astronomical price of concert tickets, don’t you think?). (BoingBoing)

  

Facebook hires former Clinton Press Secretary Joe Lockhart to manage its image and relationships with government, media. (Complex)

Not really about marketing, but important nonetheless. What would society look like free of rank-ism? What is a dignitarian society, where everyone has the right to dignity? (CNN) 

Latest industry to benefit from social media? Food trucks, which can broadcast where they are right this minute and what they're serving today to a community of fans with confirmed interest in their product. (Mashable)

Have a great weekend, and thanks for reading!

Email Isn't Dead! Permission Based Marketing Works

Lately, lots of marketers have been refocusing on email marketing as a way to better sell, keep, serve, and save customers. Though proponents of social media have declared email dead, businesses like Groupon, LivingSocial, and SniqueAway have proved them wrong. So why does email do wonders where other channels can fail?

It's all about permission-based marketing.

That's right. While all channels can be (and should be) permission-based, e-mail is by far the easiest to optimize this way and generates the best results.

How does this work?
photo © 2010 Keith Ramsey | more info (via: Wylio)

On a basic level, you should only be sending your email blasts to people who've agreed to receive them.

But it goes deeper than that.

If you sell more than one type of product, don't you want to know which of your customers are most interested? If you sell products for babies, why do you want to promote these to people without babies? Why do you want to sell garden supplies to people who don't have gardens? Why do you want to sell windshield wipers to people without cars?

You don't. (No, you really don't.)

This is where permission-based marketing comes in. Here's how it works:

Ask your customers which kinds of messages they want from you - what are they interested in and what do you they want to hear about? You can work with your e-mail vendor on this, or you can use one of several online survey tools to ask them. Then, simply send them what they want.

Why is this good?

• It helps you determine the level of interest for each of your product categories.
• You're of more value to your customers because you're only delivering content of interest.
• You're respecting your customer by letting them hear from you only as often or as rarely as they want.
• When you launch a new product, you'll have a much better idea of how many people will want it.

 Need help figuring out who wants what, where and when? Let me know.